October 29, 2007 (LAPC)--The U.S. Senate has approved $500,000 in funding to set up the Regenhard Center for Emergency Response Studies at John Jay College in Manhattan. The Center will be a research entity and information clearinghouse for the study of emergency responses to large-scale disasters. Named after a NY firefighter who lost his life during the 9/11 attacks, the Center was organized by, and will be run by, Glenn Corbett, a John Jay professor of fire science. "The World Trade Center will be our starting point," says Corbett, according to the New York Post, October 29.

The right wing New York Post goes ape over this development, fearing continued attacks against Republican Presidential candidate and former NY mayor, Rudy Giuliani. Both the memorialized firefighter's mother, Sally Regenhard, and Corbett have hit hard against Giuliani for poor performance before, during, and since the 9/11 attacks. What's even worse is that Giuliani is running for President as one of the American heroes of 9/11, claiming, as exemplified at a stump speech at Pat Robertson University recently, that "the thing that distinguishes me on terrorism is that I have more experience in dealing with it" than the other presidential candidates.

Village Voice reporter, Wayne Barrett, October 23, reveals that--in private testimony before the 9/11 Commission that is not to be publicly released until after the 2008 elections--Giuliani did not bring in any experts on terrorism to brief his staff prior to 9/11. The fire commissioner, Tom Von Essen said he was told nothing at all regarding terrorism prior to 9/11.

Barrett's report continues, "Twice, Giuliani dodged the commission's questions about the radios used by first responders - one of the key critiques of the city's 9/11 response made by New York and national firefighters' unions. The city's firefighters were stuck with the same analog radios that had malfunctioned in 1993, when the World Trade Center was first attacked." "Similarly, when Giuliani was pressed about the "repeater" or amplifier that was installed at the World Trade Center after the 1993 bombing to aid firefighter radio communications there, the memorandum indicates simply: "No knowledge."

Not only was this answer an indication of how little attention Giuliani paid to fire response and other security issues at the complex prior to 9/11, it was an indication that he wasn't taking the critique of the city's response seriously even years later. In response to a recent video released by the firefighters' union attacking Giuliani on this issue, his campaign has been trying to shift the blame to the repeater, suggesting that it was the failure to trigger this system that caused the firefighters not to hear evacuation orders."

Ghoul-iani takes his rightful place in the Presidential Campaign Halloween Parade. Watch for him haunting your neighborhood.